Why do all tennis players fall down after winning a big match/grandslam?

I've watched tennis for over 10 years now and love the sport, but this has just been a huge pet peeve of mine. Everyone, and I mean everyone falls down in some shape or form to the ground and starts doing snow angels after they win a grandslam or a big match. WTF is up with that?

Who the hell started this? cuz its incredibly stupid. I mean can't someone go and find a more creative way to celebrate a big win other than to do what the past 120 guys before you have done? For federer I've noticed it gets faker and faker cuz he's already won so many times and I'm starting to think the tears are starting to be fake too. And its not just Fed.

I saw a recent win by Donald Young, maybe a rerun but after he beat Querry in the Juniors championship he fell to the ground in a fake, sorta girly, premedidated, prerehearsed kinda way and then got up immediately right afterwards. The fall was the most hilarious thing cuz I think he was hesitant about what to do so he just did a slow motion robot like fall and then when he was on the ground probably thought , "oh this is stupid why the hell did I just do that?" and got up.

Can someone plz explain? Is this a tennis tradition or is it written in tennis law somewhere?

Probably all the tension being let out, personally I couldn't stop screaming after Van Der Sar saved Anelka's penalty the other week.

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yeah, it's overwhelming emotion from the win.. i mean how would you feel if you had just won one of the biggest tournaments in history. i know i'd collapse, for my body would lose all feeling at the shock. i dont think i'd be able to get up right away either.

i think nadal's are the best though, he just drops like a ragdoll, lol.

yeah, it's overwhelming emotion from the win.. i mean how would you feel if you had just won one of the biggest tournaments in history. i know i'd collapse, for my body would lose all feeling at the shock. i dont think i'd be able to get up right away either.

i think nadal's are the best though, he just drops like a ragdoll, lol.

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yea i kinda see what you mean about the emotion and stuff. But I still think tennis players are incredibly uncreative in expressing that emotion. I mean don't NBA players and football players feel that same typa emotion when they win a championship? I rarely see them fall to the floor, they all up and jumping and hugging. And even in individual sports like in the olympics like track and such, the atheletes don't fall to the floor, they celebrate standing up. I think tennis may be the only sport where you can get away with fall to the floor like that. If I were playing any other sport and I fell to the ground after I won, people are gonna be like " Who the hell is that wierdo." You know what I mean? Its just very befuddling.

I have to admit that I kind of liked Safin's stoic 'celebration' after hitting that ace to win the Australian.

It suits him. As in, "ho-hum... another day at the office."

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Lol love SAfin. would love to see video clip of this. And I agree with the poster above, Federer is one of the worst at celebrating. I love the guy but his celebrations seem so forced, so awkard , so uneasy for some reason.

Roger is the worst 'faller' of them all. Just ask Hollywood for a body double next time, Rog. You're not Baryshnikov.

Nor Borg, for that matter.

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So you don't think Fed's celebrations are genuine? In my opinion if he works so hard to win a major he can celebrate in any way he wants in the end,he deserves it.He does have a great passion for the game IMO otherwise he wouldn't have dominated this much.

Interesting observation, but what would you suggest? Hug your opponent, do the winning dance by yourself on center court? THe difference is in basketball and football, the players can hug each and celebrate immediately with each other. I think it's the emotional release. It's like just letting it all fall out. A kind of "Finally.... I've worked hard and played hard.....it's all over. I won! I won!" An wonderful feeling indeed. You can't hug yourself out there, can you? Now that would be so weird.

So you don't think Fed's celebrations are genuine? In my opinion if he works so hard to win a major he can celebrate in any way he wants in the end,he deserves it.He does have a great passion for the game IMO otherwise he wouldn't have dominated this much.

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Nah. Fed's a good, genuine guy. He's lovable.

But he's a terrible 'faller'. You have to note that me criticizing Roger for falling badly is done with my tongue somewhat in cheek.

Lol love SAfin. would love to see video clip of this. And I agree with the poster above, Federer is one of the worst at celebrating. I love the guy but his celebrations seem so forced, so awkard , so uneasy for some reason.

Probably all the tension being let out, personally I couldn't stop screaming after Van Der Sar saved Anelka's penalty the other week.

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I couldn't stop crying

The falling to the floor annoys me too. I disagree with Fed faking it though. I think he really feels thaat way whenever he wins a slam, because he's getting closer to sampras records. The tears don't always come.. but just on special occassions like 5 wimby's in a row. If he is to win Roland Garros this year, I would love him to do what I would do.. Just start running with your arms in the air, roaring, crying,screaming, dancing, say hello to Djoko's parents in the process, going to my family, make love to my girlfriend (not sure if I would in Roger's case) and fall to the floor only after ten minutes of running around like an idiot.

Thats what I would do if I were Roger winning his thirteenth grandslam and first Roland Garros title.

By the way.. They don't do it all. Roger Wimbledon 2006, I don't really remeber hewitt falling either but that could be me

as someone mentioned along with the picture, i too, believe borg started this. looking back on it, i thought it was pretty wierd at the time, but he was borg, #1, and otherwise went through the entire tournament in very stoic fashion. i agree that everyone since is doing a version of borg's original, and most of the time it is gratuitous and amusing, but also many times seems like poor sportsmanship. in my opinion, out of respect for your opponent, you ought to immediately go up to the net and shake hands before you start your celebration with your supporters or fall down or climb into the stands or whatever.

It amazes me at how critical people are at how athletes celebrate their successes. Whether it is tennis or football or baseball or whatever you always have someone that doesn't like or understand why an athlete celebrates a certain way.

Most will never know how much work went into winning a major tournament or slam, or how physically and mentally demanding sports are at the highest level.

It's easy for some to sit on the couch eating potato chips and say how they'd celebrate by just walking up and shaking the person's hand or whatever.

If I won Wimbledon or the French, I'd make an ass out of myself I'd be so happy. Probably dance and moonwalk around like those idiots on Maury Povich who learned the paternity test came back negative.

as someone mentioned along with the picture, i too, believe borg started this. looking back on it, i thought it was pretty wierd at the time, but he was borg, #1, and otherwise went through the entire tournament in very stoic fashion. i agree that everyone since is doing a version of borg's original, and most of the time it is gratuitous and amusing, but also many times seems like poor sportsmanship. in my opinion, out of respect for your opponent, you ought to immediately go up to the net and shake hands before you start your celebration with your supporters or fall down or climb into the stands or whatever.

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1.Yea I agree with that. I think as the opponent its very rude to see the person just beat you fall down, cry, cry some more, and have to wait like 3 minutes before you get to shake his damn hand and get off the court. I mean the whole time the loser is literally standing at the net waiting , pissed off that he lost and also because you're taking your time flooding the court.

2. to the guy who said he'd bet me Rfed would cry genuinely if he won French. Yes, of course that would be genuine, you know how much a French Open win means to him? But what I was referring to as fake or "looks fake" is all those wins he's just kinda mindlessly raking up in Australia and the US Open where it kinda gets old for him after winning it like 4 years in a row. I mean he's running out of ideas on how to act after that. But he's never won the FO b4 so htat's different.

3. finally, Thanks to the above poster who attached the Safin response after winning a gs. I kinda liked it, he was cool and calm, raised his hands in triumph, didn't do anything ostentacious, didn't fake any tears or whatnot, he was just happy he won and he immediately went to the loser and shook his hand to show respect. On the flip side I think this would be totally hillarious if someone just dropped to the ground and cried for 5 + minutes before getting up after winning a gs. And I want to see a split screen, one camera on the winner pathetically rolling around on the ground crying and another camera zoomed in on the facial expression of the loser who has to stand at the net waiting for this dude to get it together and come shake his hand. Lol, that would be priceless television.

It amazes me at how critical people are at how athletes celebrate their successes. Whether it is tennis or football or baseball or whatever you always have someone that doesn't like or understand why an athlete celebrates a certain way.

Most will never know how much work went into winning a major tournament or slam, or how physically and mentally demanding sports are at the highest level.

It's easy for some to sit on the couch eating potato chips and say how they'd celebrate by just walking up and shaking the person's hand or whatever.

If I won Wimbledon or the French, I'd make an ass out of myself I'd be so happy. Probably dance and moonwalk around like those idiots on Maury Povich who learned the paternity test came back negative.

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Hey i agree with a lotta your points. Let me clarify, I'm not neccessarily criticizing the players for their show of emotion. I mean I think its very cool and wonderful that they are able to show that typa emotion out there because it shows the fans that they truly care. But what i'm criticizing is the fact that the tennis celebration is by far and away the most predictable and cliched and boring celebration in all of sports. I mean everybody celebrates by falling to the ground and I'm just wondering why no one has any imagination or personality to buck the trend and do something different other than apparently Marat Safin. I mean can't you do a fist pump, jump in the air, do some backflips, run around the court with your national flag or something other than just falling down with your hands in a victory pose? I think that's part of the reason why some of these celebrations are criticized as being fake, because are you seriously going to believe that of these hundreds of grand slam winners, they all feel the same exact way and express it the same exact way? It just seems so scripted like they're following some tennis rulebook or cookbook recipe, step 1. fall to the ground, step 2. raise your hands in a victory pose, step 3. pretend to cry or cry if the tears come out, step4. make sure you don't stay down there for more than 8 seconds, step 5. shake your opponents hand. i mean come on!

I play a lot of intramural sports and when I celebrate a win I basically just go crazy. Its like disinhibition. I'm so pumped up and excited i'm screaming and fist pumping in the air and all that. So I guess that's where I don't understand the tennis celebration much and that's why I've posted in search of an explaination. Is it because its such a noble sport so you're supposed to temper down your emotions and seem more gentlemanly I suppose? Cuz if I did win a GS, I'd probably jump up in the air do some awkard dance and throw my racket into the stands as far as I can while probably inadvertently blurting out some expletives or give out a primal howl or two because i'd be so happy and exuberant to win a GS. Would the media be all over me and proclaim me the Howard Dean of tennis and criticize how uncultured I am? Is that why the players all just fall down, because its the sort of unspoken, appropriate, acceptable way to celebrate a GS victory?

3. finally, Thanks to the above poster who attached the Safin response after winning a gs. I kinda liked it, he was cool and calm, raised his hands in triumph, didn't do anything ostentacious, didn't fake any tears or whatnot, he was just happy he won and he immediately went to the loser and shook his hand to show respect.

Safin is COOL. I remembered he didn't celebrate much either when he beat Federer in the AusOpen semi. He just leaned against the net with both his arms extended and waited patiently for Roger to walk from the baseline to the net to shake hands.

Interesting thread. I think Borg started the drop to your knees after winning thing. Interestingly though, he was really the only one to do it. Connors and McEnroe would both stay standing and raise their arms. McEnroe had the same celebration at the US Open in 1980 and Wimbledon in 81. He put away a volley, bent his knees a little, and raised his arms. Connors usually did something similar, although after he hit a service winner to beat McEnroe in the 82 Wimbledon final he jumped in the air.